


You Could Be My Unintended

by lanyon



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, Soulmate AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-14 03:02:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9157204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lanyon/pseuds/lanyon
Summary: In a world in which soulmates are a fragile thing, Alexei is determined to outstubborn his future soulmate.





	

**Author's Note:**

> All the love and thanks to Nat and Donya and Sarah and Michelle. Title from _Unintended_ by Muse which is very much the theme for this story.

Alexei’s phone rings, and a cactus appears on his screen. 

“Sweetheart,” he says, grandly. “Beautiful,” he croons.

“You’re with the Russians, aren’t you?” asks Kent. 

“You know me so well, my darling.”

Kent laughs. “Okay, call me later.”

+

Soulmates aren’t happy ever after, not on the first go-round. 

No one really believes the fairy tales. The best and rarest soulmates are the equal sorts and everyone has heard of the unhappy, unequal soulmates, who are unluckier than the ones who never meet. 

The most common, by far, are the ones who join together for a time, before they separate, and wash up, like driftwood on some distant shore, in the hope that someone finds them lovely.

They are usually young, and there is usually hope, that they are not damaged beyond repair. There is usually hope that they are not unhappy, unequal.

+

They were drafted together. A lot of people forget that because Parson went first, pale under the lights, and Zimmermann went to hospital (or rehab, or prison, or a school for Canadian secret agents; Alexei has heard it all), and Alexei went a respectable fifth, following a well-beaten path from Magnitogorsk. 

He went east, and Parson went west(, young man) and Alexei never expected their paths to cross so often.

+

You’re a teenager and you find your soulmate. You both love the same thing, and you both love each other, and you are lucky. You are the luckiest boy. 

Except, if you had to choose between hockey and your soulmate, you would choose your soulmate. 

Except, if your soulmate had to choose between hockey and you, he would choose hockey.

 

+

“Did you know?” asks Parson, who’s too young to drink in the States but he’s enjoying his mediocre beer in Vancouver. “The first guy to drive across the continental US followed the railroad because. Well. I guess they didn’t have iPhones and, like, Google Maps.”

(A note: Parson plays dumb and Alexei recognises it instantly because he does the same.)

“I did not know,” says Alexei, carefully.

“He picked up a dog, too,” says Parson. “Called Bud. I like dogs.”

“I did know this,” says Alexei.

(Another note: Parson is the sort of man who will cross the street - no, he’ll cross a busy highway - just to pet a dog.)

“Why are you here?” A heavy arm is draped over Alexei’s shoulders and, to judge from Parson’s grunt, he has the matching pair. “Rookies huddling together for warmth?” 

“Sasha,” says Alexei, with a sense of impending doom. 

“You should be enemies, no? Draft rivals, always the biggest story.”

+

A man touches his soulmate and he knows it, in an instant. 

It is like pressing cold fingers against a hot radiator; there is a shock of no-feeling and then the pain of all-feeling. It is the scorch of hot Borscht down a throat, in the way that it is nourishing and scalding all at once.

A man touches his soulmate and knows that it is not a match, in an instant. The radiator cannot feel cold fingers. What is a warm throat after a bubbling pot?

\+ 

Alexei doesn’t mean to put truth into Sasha’s words but then the Aces play the Falconers in Providence the next month and Parson scores a hat trick and he’s still a fucking teenager, with an Olympic silver medal. 

Alexei doesn’t see what happens but the third period is almost over and the are fists and Parson’s helmet is on the ground and there’s bright red blood on his teeth and, worse, Fitz is on the ground. Alexei doesn’t even see that Parson’s gloves aren’t off before he swings at him. 

Parson’s too dazed even to look betrayed as he’s helped off the ice. 

Alexei gets a three match ban and Parson’s back on the ice for the Aces’ next game, racking up the points like scoring in the NHL is easy. 

+

The right soulmate at the wrong time is the wrong soulmate.

+

Alexei doesn’t know when he began to resent Parson, who wins the Calder by an enormous margin, and everyone says he’s going to be given the C before the end of the off-season.

Parson’s speech is short and oddly sweet and he thanks his grandparents and his sisters and his agent and he pauses, like he’s forgotten to say something, before he leaves the stage, looking young and tired and somehow undefeated. 

+

When soulmates separate, it’s best to make it a clean break. There is no hope of moving on or finding that elusive second soulmate; the laws of diminishing returns apply. 

When soulmates separate, there are jagged edges that may be smoothed away by time, or sharpened by love; new angles like a whole new jigsaw piece that may or may not fit with someone new. 

Start at the corners first, and fill in the bits in the middle. It’s a simple enough concept. 

+

It is fortunate that their paths don’t cross often. A couple of games, an All-Star appearance or two, occasional awards shows. Alexei can let his resentment simmer until Parson sidles up to him during a stoppage in play. 

“I see you liking my Instagram posts.”

Alexei harrumphs around his mouthguard. “Not your posts. Kit’s posts.”

Parson grins widely. “You should come by and meet her. You know. After we kick your asses.”

+

Soulmates are seldom platonic. 

+

Parson is hard to avoid. The secret is that Alexei doesn’t want to avoid him. Not anymore. He has been a half-person for years; he should have snapped this fledging, one-way bond as soon as he knew it was unrequited. He should have broken its neck. 

_Come to Vegas_ , Parson says, hopeful and happy. _Before the season. Come to Vegas and we can be tourists._

Parson isn’t from Vegas. Alexei knows this. Parson spends the whole year in Vegas which makes Alexei think he has no family. 

Maybe this will be the time that Alexei will touch Parson and Parson’s eyes will fly open and his jaw will drop and he’ll swipe his tongue over his lower lip and say _Oh, it’s you_. 

+

There are people who can’t bond. 

Some say they won’t bond.

Some say they are soulblind and soulmute. 

People who can’t bond are to be pitied, so usually they are hated.

+

“It hurts,” says Parson. “It hurts so much.”

It hurts so much to have Parson breaking down in his arms because Parson is the sort to let a thing fester, and then to poke at it and to be somehow surprised at the eruption of pain. 

“He has a soulmate,” says Parson. “A new one. I don’t blame him. I was an asshole. God, I’m such an asshole. I’m sorry, Lyosha, I’m sorry.” 

Alexei strokes Parson’s hair, as though it doesn’t hurt, as though he is not plunging his icy hands into hot water. “Don’t be sorry, be little mad. Works for me.” 

Parson laughs softly and he clings to Alexei. “Ugh, I’m all snot and student beer. Ugh.”

“Like you anyway,” says Alexei, pulling back a little to look at Parson, to cup his face with one hand, even though the skin of his palm feels like it’s blistering. 

“God knows why,” says Parson because, unlike God, Kent Parson honestly does not know why.

“Go shower,” says Alexei. “I’ll make tea.”

“I hate your gross tea,” says Parson, but he is more peaceful now and it frustrates Alexei that Parson, for all his tendency to fling himself at an immovable object, has not been worn down, and that his edges do not yet fit Alexei’s corners. 

+

The longer a bad bond endures, the tougher it gets. It’s like scar tissue, a poor attempt at healing.

+

The secret is that Alexei is no better than Parson; he cannot disentangle himself and he doesn’t want to. 

Parson pines for his former soulmate, who becomes Alexei’s teammate. 

Alexei pines for his soulmate. 

Alexei is not a good man; he hopes his soulmate has been worn down. He hopes that his edges fit Alexei’s corners. 

It is after a hard game, when Parson played dirty and Alexei could cheerfully have throttled him, that it happens. 

Parson, for once, is the last person Alexei wants to see but that seldom stops a man like Kent Parson. The set of his jaw is heroic and wholesome and determined and he reaches for Alexei’s hand and Alexei has half a mind to jerk it away; he does not want the blistering pain tonight. 

Parson touches Alexei and Parson’s eyes fly open and his jaw drops and he swipes his tongue over his lower lip and says, “Oh, it’s you.” 

He lowers his gaze and holds one of Alexei’s hands in both of his (soft hands, Alexei thinks, except Parson’s nails are bitten down and he has calluses and a crooked little finger). 

“Have you been waiting long?” asks Parson, with such innocence. 

“Not long,” says Alexei, gruffly, because he would have waited a lifetime. “Is this what it’s like?” He looks down in wonder at their hands. It is neither warm, nor cold, but right, like slipping on his hockey gloves at the start of a game.

“You’ve never?”

“No,” says Alexei. “Just you.”

"Do you mind?" asks Parson. "A second-hand soulmate?"

"No," says Alexei, and finds it's true.

+

The bonding experience is different for every set of soulmates even if the aftermath is the same; a constant awareness of the other and a certain symbiosis.

+

Alexei is a smart man. He is smart enough to play the fool and if his teammates in Providence think he has a beautiful girlfriend in Russia, a beautiful soulmate, then it means they don’t think he has a beautiful sort-of-boyfriend in Las Vegas. 

Fortunately, Sasha and Zhenya play along with it, while Tema and Vovochka invariably look confused but they’re in the West so it doesn’t matter so much.

(Kent’s contact details are saved in his phone under a cactus emoji.

It’s because Kent is prickly and lives in a desert and because Alexei is hilarious.)


End file.
